Does creation cause people to lose the faith?

Published: 19 February 2013 (GMT+10)

May I congratulate Rev M for his stance and for articulating so comprehensively the damage CMI and its followers, and all creationists, are doing to Christianity. Do you all
honestly not realise that many Christians are horrified at how you are destroying the credibilty of Christ from within. I too have seen many leave or refuse to consider Him because
of the very real damage being done by creationism. People need God. God whose works and creation are being revealed through real science and real understanding of the nature and
beauty of Genesis, not your false, simplistic versions of His created works and overly simplistic lack of understanding of His words. You need to face up to facts before you destroy
the whole church. You need to stop and take on board the criticisms levelled. You need to stop before it is too late

These are interesting comments but, to be frank, they are full of emotional rhetoric, and what we might phrase as ‘elephant hurling’ (that is, making assertions that
assume huge amounts of debatable assumptions). Despite the weighty sounding claim there is no demonstrable evidence that ministries like CMI damage the Christian faith. How can there
be? After all, we just believe the Bible in the same way that the Lord Jesus and his apostles did (see use of Genesis in the New
Testament). If one professes to be Christian, or a follower of Christ, then one should believe what He has to say. However, if He is wrong when it comes to Genesis, how could one
logically trust anything that He says, including “I am the way, the truth and the life”
(John 14:6), especially if He is not speaking the truth. Jesus Himself said, “If I
have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you heavenly things?”
(John 3:12). Of course, you could subscribe to the view that theistic evolution groups like
Biologos profess. They simply say that Jesus and the apostles were wrong when it came to Genesis. Now
try using that approach to unbelievers! If you believe that we should interpret the very words of the Creator based upon ever-changing scientific opinions then quite simply, the
Bible is not your authority, secular scientific interpretations are. So one wonders what sort of Christian that makes one.

It is not logically consistent for any professing Christian to say they left the church after they were exposed to information that the Bible is true, and the Words of Christ
are trustworthy.

I cannot accept or believe your charge that lots of people leave the church because of Biblical Creation. In my
some 22 years of working in this ministry (with probably a lot more firsthand experience than yourself, respectfully—at least hundreds of people in different churches every
single month), I have never met a single individual who came to Christ because he ‘discovered’ he could reconcile evolution with the Bible. Of course, there might be
some, but we are drawing comparisons here. By contrast, we have received thousands of testimonies over the years from people who became Christians because they came to understand
that the alleged science of evolution is nothing of the sort. Sure, there will always be people who deny Christ for all sorts
of reasons—and they may use creation arguments as an excuse, but at the end of the day this is only to justify their atheism and their willful sin condition. If someone
claimed to be a Christian and was in the church, and was taught that Creation was true, and then left the church, then I would have to question if they were really saved in the
first place. It is not logically consistent for any professing Christian to say they left the church after they were exposed to information that the Bible is true, and the Words
of Christ are trustworthy. After all, the Lord Jesus reminded us that, “If they do not hear Moses and the Prophets, neither will they be convinced
if someone should rise from the dead” (Luke 16:31). By the way, the ‘Moses and the
prophets’ he refers to wrote the first five books of the Bible (the Torah), which includes Genesis.

You also comment that our views are simplistic (not ‘sophisticated’ perhaps as Richard Dawkins describes). Why is that a bad thing? We just believe what the Bible
says and then attempt to back it up with a lot of ‘real’ science. Logically, your view says we can’t trust God at His Word. Or at best we need secular
scientists, who don’t believe the Bible to start with, to help us understand the ‘hidden’ meanings in there, and then allow them to interpret God’s Word
for us? Yet, the ‘author and finisher of our faith said, “Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child
shall not enter it” (Mark 10:15). Simple faith seems to be virtue, not something to be ridiculed
for.

Christians horrified?

With regard to your comments about how many Christians are horrified at what we are professing, it appears you did not take the time to read the comments below the article.
It’s not surprising because it would once again demonstrate that your claims are a work of fiction. Overwhelmingly, the feedback from Christians supported our stance in
upholding the authority of Scripture.

I’m surprised that any professing Christian could think that a loving God is revealed in an evolutionary scenario of millions of years of death and struggle. If so, then
one is sorely mistaken and obviously doesn’t really understand the philosophical basis of evolution. Even Charles Darwin believed that evolution and Christianity were
incompatible. It seems ironic then that lay commentators like you seem to understand evolution better than the modern father of evolution himself. May I recommend you
read Did God create over billions of years? to comprehend why evolution is a problem for the Gospel.

Theistic evolutionists have never provided a satisfactory explanation of why a loving God would use such a cruel and wasteful method of death to create.

Also, one of the most asked questions or reason people reject the faith today is because they see a world full of death and suffering and even blame God. How would you answer
that? Theistic evolutionists have never provided a satisfactory explanation of why a loving God would use such a cruel and wasteful method of death to create. But by taking a
biblical stance, the glorious Gospel of Christ is revealed in the fact that He did do something about all the death and suffering in the world. Please read
Understanding death to understand why. When we see bad things happen in the world it should be a reminder that something is
wrong with Creation. I fail to see how God can be glorified, as you suggest, by claiming God ‘did it that way’.

We criticized the chaplain because he was actually subscribing to a form of censorship by only wanting little ones to hear evolution and no evidence for Creation—not even
allowing them to hear all the information and make up their own minds. Yet, the statistics about children leaving the church
(and their reasons for it) are well-substantiated. Leading little ones astray is a grievous offence in the eyes of Christ who said, “Whoever causes one
of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea”
(Mark 9:42). So rather than criticizing us with fact-free assertions, I recommend, for the health of your own
faith, that you spend some time finding out what creationists actually believe (like researching the almost 9,000+ articles on this site, at the time of writing), and you might
find your own faith energized when you come to realize that God really is the Creator per His Word. For instance Stephen C. wrote to us and said:

“When I came to this website [creation.com] a year ago and after reading a few articles answering my most difficult and curious questions, I thought to myself,
‘Finally! No more smoke screen treatments!’ It’s so nice to get real information and a healthy dose of actual, clear, conclusive science rather than a false
religion being shoved down my throat (Evolutionary Theory: A religion whose followers have to keep changing their theories and coming up with new explanations when facts point
against it)! You guys rock! God bless, and I hope you all keep up the good work.”

Or Fredje J. who emailed to say:

“Your (CMI) work was very important for me in becoming a faithful believer in the Bible … I was an atheist (and convinced of evolution) until a year ago, then I
started to listen to those “crazy young earth believers” trying to disprove them, and here I am now. Praise the Lord! Through YouTube I got to know CMI and it made a
big difference.”

A demonstration of how people actually came to the faith because of Creation teaching—not the other way around! In all seriousness, how many examples could you supply of
evolutionists becoming Christians because of evolution?

I understand that I’m using very direct language in this message. This is because we have so much evidence of how much harm theistic evolution has caused in the
Church—i.e. if the Bible is wrong when it talks about God creating, then how can we trust the rest of the book? Moreover, assertions were made that do not have any basis in
reality. Conversely, we see people strengthened in their faith and more enthusiastic about evangelism when ‘the lights switch on’ and they realize that the Bible can be
trusted from the very first verse.

Reader’s comments

This is a great article! Evolution does not turn people in Christians, it has devastatingly turned people away. In Europe a survey was done and most people have indicated that they have left the Church because they think science contradicts it. This when polystrate trees go through "millions" of years of rock (as if they would not have disintegrated), carbon has been found in many dinosaur bones and other allegedly million year, live tissue in t-rex bones discovered by Dr. Schweitzer. Entire books by PHD scientists show that a young earth is correct and the bible is inerrant from the beginning of Genesis. I am a Catholic who believes in the traditional Catholic understanding of creation. With Pope Clement 1 I profess that reproduction did not even occur until God had created all of His creatures "Then when He had finished making ALL HIS CREATURES, God gave them His approval and blessing: INCREASE AND MULTIPLY, He charged them" (emphasis added). No millions of years here, rather a 6 day creation, is the near unanimous consent of all the fathers and doctors of the Church. For more info on the truth of young earth creation from a Catholic perspective go to [URL removed as per feedback rules]...Pax Christi!

Excellent and well stated! A big problem is the media promotes evolutionary scientists and never give air time to Christian scientists and there are just as many of each. The amount of holes there are in evolution probably number the amount of words in The Bible.

By saying that "Creation science teaching is killing the Christian faith" is making a straw man out of the real issue. Creation science teaching alone does not destroy the faith, but there is plenty of evidence that much of Christian youth, especially in America (as much as 80%), are leaving the faith because they get evolution teaching in college and feel betrayed by their home churches, Christian schools and families that taught them creation (YEC). Of course, there are many other reasons why so many of our Christian youth leave the faith in college (thank God many of them come back later on), but many have testified of feelling angry and betrayed when they came to understand that they were "lied to" by home churches after going to college and hearing what "true science" had to say. Whether evolution is true science or not is another issue that I don't want to get into. I think that Old Earth creationism is not getting enough attention as a possible alternative answer to the problem of reconciling the Bible with true science. By allegorizing Genesis 1-3 does not mean that it is wrong. We read much allegory in Revelation, and no one is saying that we have to throw out the whole Bible because of the difficulty of understanding how to apply the book of Revelation. Psalms 93:1 and 96:10 say that the Earth is immovable, and that was enough for Luther and Calvin (as well as the Catholic Church) to condemn Copernicus as of the devil. In one article here it was mentioned that Genesis 1 is not written in poetic language because there is no parallelism in the creation account, but that is not true. The first three days are a perfect parallel of the second three days of creation. If Genesis 1 is written as poetry, that does not mean that it's wrong and can't be trusted.

Thanks for these thoughts. It's common to think that evolution is the main culprit for destroying people's faith, but the second villain is billions of years. You see, the long ages are associated with rock layers supposedly formed over millions of years. Because those rock layers have fossils in them, and record the existence of animals with cancer, diseases, as well as animals eating other animals, etc, if those rock layers are evidence of millions of years, they're also evidence of millions of years of death and suffering. That means they're also evidence of that death and suffering being in existence before Adam. That means that the death and suffering can't really be the consequence of Adam's sin, because in this view, it would have long predated it. That means that in a billions-of-years worldview, God is the author of death and suffering, and called it 'very good'. Can you see how taken to its logical conclusion, this undermines the very Gospel?

To anyone advocating theistic evolution as being preferable to Biblical creation for Christianity, I'd always just point them straight to the timeless classic by Dr. Wieland. Darwin’s real message: have you missed it? I'd say "read that, then we'll talk". Most theistic evolutionists just don't realise how the whole point of evolution is to explain life without god (at all), not just the One True God. Less still do they realise how diabolical the god of evolution would be if such a god did exist, and how horrendous the idol they are setting-up in place of the One True God is.

That's why theistic evolutionists who haven't ever thought about the question (who I'd venture to suggest are probably in the overwhelming majority) tend to come around to the creation message very quickly. Those who have thought about it and still think evolution and the One True God of Christianity are compatible, well... one does have to question how much they truly love the Lord. Since you believe God is happy to use death as anything else other than punishment for sin, what are you praying to Him for if not freedom from the incontrovertably-connected death and sin?

Thank you for your intellectual acumen again. We have heard that people leave the faith because of evolutionary teaching. We have heard that many have come to faith after being evolutionists and atheists and hearing the creationist message. But this is the first time I have heard someone raise the question of whether anyone has come to faith because of evolution. And yet that is what those 'defenders of reasonable faith' want us to believe. If these theistic evolutionists believe that their faith is so reasonable and that evolution is so reasonable and good science, why can't they show instances of this? Certainly not of any one coming to 'Biblical' faith. Certainly many stay in the faith even after accepting evolution, but that is not the same. Thanks for exposing their false arguments.

There is not a conflict between the Bible and science. Problems arises when people, whose knowledge of what the Bible reveals is imperfect and whose knowledge of what science reveals is imperfect try to correctly align or compare the two. When someone has to twist or reject either the Bible or science to hold them both together, they should realize that in some area they are wrong. CMI does a great job, praise God, in showing how both God's Word and God's works are in harmony and can be held together without doing violence to either, and on the basis of this demonstrate God's Word is true and reliable and ultimately is the best explanation of 'life, the universe and everything'! Not only is this very helpful, it is a key cultural battleground. Rev M / Mark M - 'Methinks thou dost protest too much'. It is the weakest arguments that tend to be voiced the loudest!

I recently asked a friend of mine and her 10yr. old son to go to a creation seminar at a church nearby. She is a Christian but had questions as I did before I found out about CMI three or so years ago. She is a teacher and knew her son was/is learning about evolution in the public school system. Her parents go to church and had brought her up in church but they believe in evolution. She was so excited to her about creation science when I brought it to her attention about eight months ago and was glad to go to the seminar. Her and her son came away with questions answered and the fantastic feeling of being able to believe the entire word of God! I am so thankful for the work you guys do, it has changed my life for the better and I spread the word every chance I get, even taking your information to churches etc. as often as I can. I can not imagine creation science and believing all of Gods word being a problem for any believer. Stay strong and keep the information coming!

I had not given much thought to the apologetics of Christianity, but as I progressed in my experience with unbelievers and why I believed, as Paul said, I wanted to have an answer to people's questions. I have always wanted to understand creation, yet felt there was no definite need to question the Bible regarding how we got here, when all the other questions that I asked were answered in the pages of the Holy Bible. I am still letting God through the Holy Ghost, lead the way and will be learning about the Bible and the world continually. Apologetics is fascinating and as one progresses through the many questions skeptics ask, there is what I see as always a Biblical answer to worldly questions.!

I can attest to cmi's stance. When i first got saved i truly believed evolution, hands down. I though the bible was fallible because of it. One day God spoke to me (as He always does) and asked do u trust me? I said yes. "Then believe my Word." This was hard cuz intellectually i saw NOOOOOOO evidence in support of it. Though i did given in and trust Him, cuz He had earned my trust over those first few months.

Months later while i still trusted God this wrecked my intellectual side, it really plagued me. I can confidently say i no longer believe evolution but still it was a battle. Anyway God in His goodness finally put my head to rest. I came upon an awesome creationist organization. A organization that actually intellectually explained how creation was true and showed all the holes and impossibilities in evolution. It realllllly liberated me - the truth shall indeed set u free - i felt such a wieght taken off. I really dove into it head first so excited and happy. One of THE - hands down - THE BEST faith boosting expierences of my life. An entire part of my core being my intellectual side was soothed. And im a thinker too i love apologetics, so my intellect is super important to me. Lol i said intellect not writting skills.

By far this site is the best at what it does this and kent hovinds stuff. Kent is my original source of freedom under Christ. Boy it ROCKED the ever living out of my faith. So awesome.

You guys keep up the awesome awesome awesome work. Your really helping ppl regardless of if u see it or not.

There are so many comments already, but I want to say that if the standard of rhetoric from the evolutionists only ever qualifies as emotive, assumption-filled sophistry in the form of rants, and CMI provide sound rational arguments, then it doesn't take Sherlock Holmes to figure out whose message is genuine.

It never ceases to amaze me that the evolutionists claim to own rationalism yet can never provide a lucid paragraph that does not involve some form of common fallacy. It gets old after a while.

I can't even understand how can there be people such as Mark M and Rev M. CMI's work not only helps unbelievers to come to faith, but helps believers strengthen their faith.

Before stumbling on creation.com, I considered myself a theistic evolutionist, even if I did believe that Noah's flood was global (not aware of the geological implications). I was a faithful Christian, but there always was a lingering doubt about whether this world was in accordance with the Bible or not that hindered me from witnessing efficiently.

When I first investigated CMI's claims, it was because I wondered why diabolizing Darwin because of his "discovery". I indeed wouldn't have lasted on the site if I didn't notice a phrase (can't even remember which phrase) that made me think : "Well, these guys are not sectarians nor cultists. They are genuine Christians.".
Then I stumbled upon a Carl Wieland's article which exposed the theological problem of putting millions of years before Adam. I acknowledged the relevance of the argument but kept on thinking : "Yet the facts speak for themselves."
I began to doubt evolution when I saw something about evolution not being the rock-solid science I always thought it was.
The last barriers crumbled when I read Dr Humphreys' "Evidence for a young world". It was so wonderful for me to understand that we live in the world of the Bible and not another world.

It gave me great confidence for witnessing, because I knew that truth is by my side. And indeed, my presentation about Cain's wife was very well received last December 31st in my church. That's why I can tell Mark M's argument is absurd.

Because the greatest thing with CMI is that not only do they present us with evidences for the authority of the Bible, they equip us to spread it efficiently around us

I don't think - in fact I know! - that I'll never be able to thank God enough for my fellowship with CMI and to be priviliged to use CMI's valuable resources to promote the Kingdom of our beloved Saviour and King!
Ernt Viljoen

As someone who works with youth and young people, I have seen no greater barrier preventing so many people coming to accept Yeshua as I see in evolution, although hedonism come close, no small irony given that it is perhaps the defining product of evolutionist thought.

Evolution is so often proven and undeniable fact in their minds although very few can actually define the key claims of cell to man evolution, or explain the basic elements of scientific inquiry for that matter, a disturbing reality.

Evolution is great excuse of this generation and like sin, it's effects seem completely corrosive to believing the often plain and simple claims and statements made in scripture.

I would point to one concept and passage in particular: the seed and the fruit. This concept reoccurs throughout scripture on many occasions, literal, allegorical, and spiritual.

"And God said, Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, on the earth. And it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind. And God saw that it was good." (Genesis 1:11, 12 ESV)

This is very straight forward and sets us the pattern in all of scripture. Specific seed produces specific fruit, whether it is the seed of a plant, an animal, a human, or of the Spirit of God.

The fruit of God's seed does not evolve to produce selfishness instead do selflessness, nor hate instead of love. Neither does the seed of all living creatures change to produce different offspring. Indeed, even wisdom produces the same children that vindicate her, not ones that evolve into something different.

I know several people for whom evolution was a stumblingblock to believing in Jesus. Once I was able to persuade them evolution was nonsense, they became open to the Gospel. One woman in particular continues to subscribe to and read creationist material. I grew up in a Lutheran home. Lutherans don't explicitly teach that creation is true, but it's in the Creeds, and people just accept creation (unless schools indoctrinate them). The first time I heard about evolution, I thought, THIS IS NONSENSE! It makes no sense. It's not even logical. My husband told me he almost broke up with me when he learned I was a creationist, but he examined the evidence for himself, and quickly rejected evolution. Whenever he talks to anyone who believes in evolution, he argues with them. He says it is a RELIGION. He will say, "That's why people say they BELIEVE in evolution!"

I think it's unfortunate that Christianity has come to utterly reject evolution. What a beatiful and spectacular journy to Adam that was perfectly fine tuned and refined. I would like to know how the earth being billions of years old makes the Bible untrue? At any rate, Christians and science have the same underlying problem. Where is the beginning? Did God self-create himself? Did life and the universe self begin? Science and religion dont have to contradict. Religion without science is blind, and science without religion is hopeless.

We don't think Christianity rejects evolution utterly enough, unfortunately; see Evolutionary Syncretism. Evolution is incompatible with the Bible's history of creation (in six days, only several thousand years ago), Fall (which was the beginning of evil and suffering in the world), a global Flood (which covered the whole earth and is responsible for most of the fossils and extraordinary geological features we see today), and Jesus' work as the 'Last Adam'; whose role depends on there being a an actual 'First Adam', whose real sin really affects us today.

I've heard this claim so many times, mainly from Christian evolutionists. I remember when I was an evolutionist and believed it myself, though I found it odd that atheists said the opposite at the time.
Now I see why, atheist know evolution can lead to unbelief.
I was told to be scared of creationism and to never study it because it was dangerous. I see why they said that now, because I studied creationism, shattered my belief in evolution, and I'm now a creationist ;)

Years ago in my high school biology class, I realized the evolution I was being taught was not reconcilable with the Biblical record. I determined to find out the truth - if evolution was true, to turn my back on God, the Bible, the church, and my parent's beliefs. Thank God I heard of the Institute for Creation Research at that point in time and found answers that showed me there was strong evidence the Bible was the word of God. Since then, keeping up on the evidence from sites like Creation.com and sharing it with others is a passion in my life. Knowing there is abundant scientific data that supports the Biblical creation model has helped me grow stronger in my faith over the years and helped me remain strong in the face of temptation.

Three years ago I began work as a Chaplain in an Anglican College. It didn't take too long to realise that many senior students rejected the gospel on the basis that evolution ruled out the existence of a God (at least one that is good). As I explored these issues with students I began to do my own investigations with much thanks to CMI. Prior to this I would have described myself as a reluctant theistic evolutionist as I could never see how the Gospel could match the evolutionary story. My probing questions of students and staff got me into trouble and I have since had to leave my employment. What I can rejoice in is that I have a firmer view of scripture and the Genesis account of origins. Thank you CMI for your work, God is certainly blessing your work. Keep it going.

Thank you for your strong, unwaivering stance in defending God's word as revealed through scripture. It is absolutely astounding to me that professing Christians can reject that our creator God fashioned our universe in six days (because it doesn't agree with "established scientific fact"), yet accept that this same creator God came to earth as a man, died for our sins, and was resurrected to defeat our final enemy (death). This certainly doesn't agree with "established scientific fact," either. God's word isn't a "buffet" where you can pick and choose your truths - it's all or nothing. I feel genuine sorrow for those who claim Christ as their savior yet teach the fiction of evolution - I am reminded of Christ's words when He warns against those who teach false doctorine to His children. To paraphrase, it would be better that such a person had not been born, or (in another passage) better that a millstone be hung about their neck and they be drowned in the ocean. Something to think about for those who think their creator got it wrong when their creator talked about beginnings.

Heaven knows there is only one true history of universe -- only one genuine reality! Heaven knows the true doctrines of the one true faith -- "your most holy faith" (Jude 20) -- "the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints" (Jude 3, NBV)! The one true most holy faith of Christ's "little flock" has nothing to do with embracing worldly evolutionary scenarios! Jesus prophesies many would come in his name, proclaiming him Christ "and will mislead many" (Matthew 24:5 NBV)! Christianity has not "evolved" any truer or improved godly teaching since the death of Christ's apostles! While the apostles were yet alive false teachers with ungodly motives, who did not accept their authority (3 John 9, etc.) were active, corrupting the church --and there is nothing new under the sun! The words of ancient Scripture hold priority for understanding the true doctrine of the King over those of any Johnny-come-lately! John says: "the whole world lies under the dominance of the wicked one" (1 John 5:19 NBV). Fostering an utterly false history of universe as "common knowledge" is ever the scheme of the kingdom of darkness for misleading humanity into rebellion against our Creator. May each of us receive more grace to apprehend reality as heaven knows it to be!

God's Word gives us the answer repeatedly to Mark's fallacy that if someone falls away because of a teaching, the teaching must be wrong.

Matthew 6:24 “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money."

We're not talking about money, but we ARE talking about two masters. This isn't to say you can't be duped by evolution and still be saved (people who accept and love Jesus, but haven't cared enough to look into origins so just trust their secular teachers, etc.), but if you actually abandon Jesus because you (rightly) become convinced He doesn't support evolution/old-earthism/etc., you love another master more than Jesus.

John 6:66 "After this [Jesus saying some difficult things] many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him."

Was Jesus wrong to say those things? If so, Jesus would have to be a liar (even though he is God), due to John 14:10, and God cannot lie (Titus 1:2).

Look at the many parallel "narrow gate" admonitions, like Luke 13:24-30, or "friends with the world" in James 4:4. This is tempered by "become all things to all people" (1 Cor. 9:22), but Paul did not mean to compromise belief in God's Word (v. 19a, also Gal. 1:6-10, etc.).

Compromisers ignore all this and much more in order to justify replacing the plain meaning of Genesis (or any part of God's Word) with currently popular bias. Then they must explain away all the inconsistencies -- no wonder Mark felt the need to imply more complicated equals right.

When you just believe the whole Bible (being simplistic in a good way), everything is consistent -- internally and with observed reality. :)

I would like to add my name to your ever-growing list of faithful whose life has been tremendously impacted by your ministry, and for the good!
Briefly, as a child I dont recall any issues with my faith in the Word of God.
As I went through my education, at some point, I began to give credence to the 'gap theory' as it seemed to make sense to create initially, allow things to cool off, then finish the job. (notice, there is room for time, yet no life at this point) Without realizing what I was doing, I was most certainly hindering my own faith, but I was comfortable.
It honestly wasnt until I found this site (CMI) that I realized how much I truly compromised my faith, and was then able to look back on my life and see what I had done.
Your ministry, imho, saved my salvation, and put me back on the track of simplistic understanding of the Lord's word.
The difference all of your ministry associates make in touching lives of both believers and non-believers alike is profound, and a blessing of the highest order.
I pray for the Lord to open your heart to the truth of the Gospel message, and the integrity of the CMI staff in their ministry.

Rejecting evolution was a first step for me that allowed me to take other ideas seriously, such as the resurrection of Christ. It was the beginning of my journey to become a Christian.

However, I come across a multitude of former Christians who have left because they found the denial of common descent ridiculous. But they invariably reject a blind-faith-based version of creation rather than the well-reasoned responses provided by CMI. Having the mistaken idea that creation requires species-fixity, a rejection of natural selection, and Satan having a dinosaur bone factory below the earth's crust, they throw out the baby with the bathwater, having never given audience to what creationists actually believe. Unfortunately, each of those are ideas often propagated by well-meaning but entirely uneducated creationists.

Wholeheartedly agree with your stance on this issue. Evolution is a belief the secular world pressures the rest of society to accept, although, it has been disproven many times over. Even our own Supreme court heard these arguments and Creation won. However, you would think it was the other way around based on the amount of acceptance and distruibution of information in our educational system. We need to be individual thinkers and search for the real truth. The bible also says (paraphrased here) that we are held accountable because of all things seen all around us proves his very existence. So, that no man has an excuse on judgement day. On the otherhand......if a person is bent on not believing and is opposing Christian teaching at every turn, it's not because of any other reason than he hates God. The bible tells us this. He wants to oppose God period. So, keep in mind that from the beginning of time.......man repeats the same patterns over and over and it is basted in disobedience and opposition. However. Praise God for his teachings and absolute truth so that we may come to know him and have true freedom. Many blessings <3

I too can vouch for how much CMI has helped me being a Christian and to think rationally. Evolutionist tells you not to think for yourself, but how to think about the evidence. I am truly clueless of how CMI dissuades people to be Christians. And messages like these always look the same. The provide no examples of why creationism is wrong or anything. They just tell us what they think creationism is, despite of what creationism is really presenting. I agree with CMI, evolution was made to try and explain life without a God.. Since evolution requires a lot of time, they have the excuse that, "of course we won't see it today, we just know it happened".

Perhaps creation is not necessarily a salvation issue; but perhaps Mark M. and Rev M. should consider Luke 18:17 & Mathew 18:3
‘And said, Truly I say to you, unless you repent (change, turn about) and become like little children [trusting, lowly, loving, forgiving], you can never enter the kingdom of heaven [at all].’ AMP. I’m curious as to what context these texts should be interpreted by theistic evolutionists. Does trust only apply to accepting Jesus as Lord & saviour? Why not give Jesus the credit for creation as written? Have you not read? This is not something I would want to get wrong. In which Jesus are the theistic evolutionists’ putting their trust, the Jesus of the bible... or a fallible one? If Jesus was fallible, how then could he pay the price for our sins? I think Satan would have something to say about that. In regards to ‘theistic evolution’ I agree with Richard Dawkins and Frank Zindler.

Swallowing one’s pride does not lose respect; there was a time when I considered theistic evolution. Researching the mechanisms operating with natural selection did it for me. See http://creation.com/creation-tv Changes in Living Things (Part 2) Mutations, 18:45 in- Richard (Fangrad) reveals one of many evolutions’ secrets regarding bacteria ‘evolving’ antibiotic resistance. Genetics authority, Dr Sanford’s book ‘Genetic Entropy & the Mystery of the Genome’, reveals a lot. Also Dr Sarfati’s books show why Dawkins won’t debate him, although Dawkins sees merit in debating ignorant but well meaning Cardinals. Please, do the research, don't hide behind peer review.

And again ... aren't they all the same, hiding behind science; this big fortress science? What is science? Isn't it the "stuff" God made and which runs by laws God invented and then the scientists use to do their things? Scientists are in the second row, second line, God was first to handle everything there is. Yes, God let us use his property and we can experiment with it but science can only discover what is there already. Without a creator what would be there? So Mr. scientist see it this way: somebody had to hide the Easter eggs so the kids could find them.

It is people who rail against creation and compromise who really damage the impact of the gospel and the church. Mark of the UK needs to let the Holy Spirit work on him as does Rodney M of Albany. I had correspondence with a minister from my denomination, visiting from Canada I think, and sent some creation material to him. It is up to the Holy Spirit from here. This chap was a well studied theologan. I explained my beliefs and some of my life experiences being a creationist, or as my boss at work says, "biblical revelationist".
I work at a poultry farm and we have a display of CMI material as a witness. (What came first-the chicken or the egg?)

It's unfortunate that so many Ministers of Christ forget one of the basic principles of Hermeneutics (or Scripture Interpretation) which I learned at Bible College. Before arguing about whether Genesis is literal or figurative, Ministers should be finding out whether Jesus and the Apostles interpreted Genesis literally or figuratively. If Jesus has been present since the beginning of world, then surely He knows which parts of the Bible are literal and which parts are figurative. See Matt 19:4-5, Lk 17:26-27 (flood destroyed them ALL), Rom 5:14, 2 Pet 3:5-6.

If Jesus Christ is God and God is omniscient then he knows the truth about all things. If Genesis is not true and he referred to it as truth then he was lying and cannot be trusted. If he is shown to be lying about one thing then how can we believe him when he tells Nicodemus, "God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life"? It just becomes an empty promise and since the whole Bible is geared up to that message if it is not true we should not continue to propagate the lies it contains. Paul said, "If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied", then how pitiable would we be if we can't even trust him for earthly things. We might just as well put an end to ourselves as life itself becomes totally meaningless.

I was a committed atheist and evolutionist for most of my life. If I still believed in evolution then I would still be an atheist. I have yet to meet one person who left Christianity because of creationists but I know many people who have fallen away because of evolution, and others who don't want to listen to the Gospel message because they have been indoctrinated since childhood with this atheistic philosophy.

Mark M. states, "People need God. God whose works and creation are being revealed through real science and real understanding of the nature and beauty of Genesis..." Out of context, with the meaning altered by being so, I feel his statement becomes true. I came to Christianity not through an emotional experience, but by logic. I believe that if we honestly search for truth, we will find the honest truth, and it is therefore the real science that is presented by CMI and other creation ministries that has greatly strengthened my belief. Therefore, to imagine that such a ministry as CMI is, as Mark M. claims, is destroying the credibilty of Christ and causing people to leave or refuse to consider Him, is in my mind, utterly inconceivable.

It’s true what this article states, that without a firm, literal interpretation of Genesis, all meaning to Jesus’ life is lost. I started off as an atheist and one of the biggest hurdles for me was evolutionary theory and its applications to a ‘loving god’. Even after accepting Christ, I mainly tried to ignore evolution as ‘not an issue’. After a CMI breakfast however, it was plain to see that Scripture does not back up evolutionary teaching and on top of that, ‘goo to you via the zoo’ does not have any scientific backing. I’m just glad that CMI, after bringing the issue to my attention, has it backed up with this website. If this website wasn’t here, I don’t want to imagine how I would have reconciled evolution and a biblical God on my own.

I can personally testify to the helpfulness of ministries like CMI and AIG. My first year of college left me in a world of doubt, I never want to be in that state again. I knew evolution and the Bible weren't compatible, but what the university was telling me sounded unbeatable. CMI gave me the knowledge and ability to recognize bad science when I see it. Molecules to man is nothing but a childish anecdote.

I find it so sad to hear such attacks from supposedly within the church. My own life jouney is one that was originally from a long age evolution bent yet when I independantly and via resources such as CMI (AIG in those days) it led to my understanding of the reality and truth of the Bible and therefore the full measure of Christ's love for me. Regularly I talk to people over this debate and it is often the decision making thought which allows the Holy Spirit to move and true repentance to occur and the complete freedom and joy that this brings to their lives knowing the bible is completely trustworthy.

CMI, and in this case specifically Gary, you are in the right battle - for lives and eternity - and be blessed for doing so.

Mark M, respectfully, your thinking is deluded. I earned a Bth from the Adelaide College of Divinity (ACD), a very liberal theological college in South Australia. Evolution was considered to be scientific fact over the words of Genesis. The Bible was nothing more than a collection of good stories that contain the word of God. How then does one decide if the Resurrection is true of not? This form of theological training only weakens the church by weakening people's faith and removing the need for evangelism. Some years later I met a student who was most of the way thru his training. He shared that his faith was being slowly removed. I even met a priest once who described himself as a secular humanist! It was no surprise to learn that his theological training was at the same institution. Christians who try to defend a compromised view of the Bible are damaging the work of the church.

I have observed the product of removing Creation from the Christian message in a local church in my country. The second thing is Adam and Eve must become allegorical, there is no other choice.

Progress futher and now they are at the point where they don't have prayer meetings or Bible studies but they do promise to have good coffee and good conversation (their words not mine). Despite this their attendance is small. There have not been the promised droves of converts.

This is because once Creation is removed from the Christian message, Christianity becomes a pointless self-help group. This is why athiests tend to focus solely on Creation, they know that to be a core evidence for the Christian message.

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